Starbucks barista heard woman's 'high-pitched screams' coming from bathroom — he rushed to protect her newborn
Sometimes a stranger might facilitate a big milestone moment in someone's life and become the biggest help in their moment of need. A mom experienced that when a Starbucks barista helped her deliver her baby after she went into labor in the outlet's bathroom. The mom was able to deliver the baby safely with the help of the staff until help arrived. However, the barista, Griffin Baron, often wondered how the kid turned out and what happened to him until he eventually got to meet him 18 years later, as per The Record North Shore.
The baby, Jonathan Celner, was born in 2002 when Griffin Baron was a supervisor at Starbucks. The man was working that day when he heard a woman screaming for help from one of the bathrooms and rushed to help her and be by her side. He ended up helping the woman, Lisabeth Rohlck, deliver her baby on the bathroom floor. The man hadn't seen the baby since the day he was born until luck brought them together. "This was a very big thing for me and I had always wanted to know what happened to him and to the family, and what he came out to be, and I wanted to give my perspective on that day. It was definitely a big smile moment for me when we saw each other. He’s a really good guy," Baron told the outlet.
The man finally Celner in March of 2021, when the boy was 18 years old. He graduated from high school in 2020 and had been attending Oakton Community College at that time. "Our meeting was great. We talked for about an hour. He is a super cool kid. He didn’t know a lot of the insanity of what it was like. It was good to finally fill in all these holes that we had," Baron recounted. He introduced the boy to the baristas working that day and told them their story. Baron is now an administrator with the Chicago nonprofit Centro Romero as per the outlet. "I did a Google search a few years ago. It turned out the mom died of cancer in 2012 and I was really sad to hear about that," the man revealed.
He searched for the boy as Jonathan Rohlck, thinking that was his last name but couldn't find him. "I looked up Lisabeth Rohlck and found her name attached to a GoFundMe because Jonathan’s father had died last year of a heart condition. I was just heartbroken about this." He added, "I went on GoFundMe and donated for the two kids and wrote in the memo box that I had wanted to talk to the family and give them my perspective on that day." His aunt reached back to Baron and the duo was eventually able to reconnect and talk about the fateful day. The man's mom also had a VHS tape of the news about the incident that he could share with Celner.
In the tape, the mom could be seen discussing potential names for the baby who she wasn't expecting at the time because it was way before her due date. A paramedic suggested the name "Bucky" because he was born in Starbucks. "I think we will have to give him a coffee-related middle name," the mom expressed. A customer, Tricia Monico, had also helped the mom deliver the baby. She had asked Baron to call 911. "I grabbed some hot towels because that’s what I think you do, and I open the bathroom door and there’s this woman on the rail huffing and puffing and ready to go and there is the head, three-quarters out, and there is Tricia holding her hand and saying ‘You’re doing great, you’re doing great’ and four minutes later: 'Wah' (the baby was born)," the barista recounted the magical day.